This is Lindsey Halligan: Meet the insurance lawyer taking over in Virginia to prosecute Trump’s enemies

Trump’s patience ran out with interim US attorney of Eastern Virginia Erik Siebert, the person he appointed to go after two of his perceived enemies, former FBI director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James, last week when he was unable to find sufficient evidence to prosecute either of them.

Siebert resigned on Friday after the president told reporters that he wanted him out because his nomination to formally hold the position had gotten support from two Democratic Senators. In his place Trump has placed Lindsey Halligan, who until recently was his White House aide for removing “improper ideology” at the Smithsonian Institution.

Lindsey Halligan: no experience, no problem for Trump

The 35-year-old Halligan was an insurance lawyer at Cole, Scott & Kissane, where she made partner in 2018, before she entered the Trump orbit. The story goes that she attended an event at the Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach in November 2021 where she met Trump.

According to The Washington Post, she had just come from court and hadn’t had time to change out of her suit, “which probably made her stand out from other female attendees,” attracting Trump’s attention. After inquiring about her profession, he made her part of his legal team.

Other qualities that probably helped Halligan land the gig was her training in broadcast journalism and her beauty pageant looks, she made the Miss Colorado semifinals in 2009 and was third runner-up in 2010. John Rowley, a former Trump attorney told the newspaper that Trump “holds her in high regard,” and “she obviously has the president’s confidence.”

Halligan, who got her law degree from the University of Miami, has legal experience outside of the insurance industry, having worked in the Miami-Dade County public defender’s office as well as interning for the Innocence Project, which tries to exonerate people that have been wrongly convicted.

However, she has no experience as a prosecutor. She is reportedly going to ask a grand jury to indict Comey on perjury and obstruction charges. This is despite prosecutors in the office that she now heads as interim Attorney General telling her not to do so.

A source with direct knowledge told ABC News that an internal memo said that prosecutors and investigators could find no probable cause and they don’t have sufficient evidence for such a move.

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